Laugh Now, Cry Later
by s.grand
Summary: "Funny how we always end up walking, isn't it?" His voice made her jump; she hadn't heard him chase after her this time. "Don't you believe in magic, Granger?" D/Hr, rated for language.
1. Part 1

_Laugh Now, Cry Later_**  
>Disclaimer<strong>: Characters belong, sadly, to J.K Rowling (and she does a much better job with them than I do).

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><p>"Come on, Granger," he called. "Stop being such a drama queen about everything and slow down."<p>

She wanted to hit him over the head with something hard – a brick, a rock, a frying pan. Instead, she continued walking down the street, listening to the pounding of blood in her ears.

She could have just Apparated, right then and there. But something held her earth-bound and she continued walking, and for whatever reason, he followed her.

"Granger, what is this about? Seriously. If this is just a phase that you'll get over the next time I see you, then I'll just leave now–"

She rounded on him then. He seemed shocked by her sudden confrontation, as if he simply expected her to keep walking. "Fuck you, Malfoy. I told you to stay away from her. I _warned _you."

He looked like he didn't care, and that in itself was enough to infuriate her more than she ever thought possible. "So I'm dating your friend. Big deal. Get over it."

"_Get over it_?" she repeated. "You're going to hurt her, Malfoy. You screw women and then act like it's nothing, that's who you are. She's not like that, she doesn't do these things casually."

He had the nerve to look uninterested. "This isn't your problem, Granger. It has nothing to do with you."

"She's my _friend_, Malfoy. Look it up in a dictionary sometime."

"She's old enough to take care of herself. Like you said, you're her friend, not her mother."

Hermione turned around and continued walking.

"I'm not up for a marathon today, Granger. If you keep walking, I won't follow you. Why don't you tell me what the real problem is so I can go home?"

The tone of his voice had changed. She turned around to see him smirking.

"What?"

"You're not pissed off because I might hurt her," Draco said, that exasperating smirk still on his face. "You don't even care. That's not what this whole blow-up is about, is it?"

Hermione resisted the urge to roll her eyes. "Why don't you tell me?" she challenged, crossing her arms across her chest. "Go ahead. You seem to think you have some sort of valuable insight into my mind."

The smirk was turning into a grin. "Oh, come off it, Granger. Just admit you want me so I can ditch your friend, and you and I can get it on like sexually starved bunnies."

For a moment, Hermione remained silent. Then, finally, "You're an arrogant son of a bitch, Malfoy. You know that?"

She turned around and started to walk away again, but not before noticing that her heart had stopped pounding blood in her ears and was instead beating away against her chest.

Draco ran up to walk in step with her. He was laughing. "You're a treat, Granger, you really are. Come on, don't be angry. I'll tell your friend I'm a shameless fucker before I fuck her, ok?"

"Fuck _you_."

"Well, that's what I mean, Granger. I know you want to. You should just admit it. It's unhealthy to keep those sorts of feelings hidden so deep. How long haven't you had sex, anyway?"

"You're sick." Hermione retorted, but her resolve to stay mad at him was already wavering. It had begun to waver the minute he'd started teasing her.

"I know." The tone of his voice was now downright cheery. "It's charming, isn't it?"

She turned her head away from him to hide her face because the corners of her lips had begun to twitch, as hard as she tried to fight it.

They were passing a supermarket when he told her to wait, and he went inside. He came out holding a lollipop. "I think I gave the guy too much money. The asshole took it all, though. I can never understand how this Muggle money stuff works."

He held the lollipop out to her. "Forgive me?" he asked, his voice still carrying that teasing edge. He waved the lollipop in the air, like a white flag signaling a truce. His silver eyes were shining, a lazy grin on his face.

She took it. She didn't stand a chance.

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><p><strong>AN: **This is for all the people who read _Remnants of Yesterday_ and wished our little couple here had a happy ending. Look forward to new chapters soon (and they'll be longer than this one, I promise), and let me know what you think so far!


	2. Part 2

"Can I ask," Harry said, trying to make himself comfortable on Draco's stiff, too-large couch, "why we've started hanging out here?"

"What's wrong with here?"

"Honestly? It gives me the creeps." He rubbed his arms and looked around. They were sitting in the Malfoy Manor living room, and Hermione could see why he was bothered by it – it was too fancy, too stuffy, too large, too much of everything. "Like that. That thing over the fireplace? That's creepy."

He was staring at the portrait of Lucius Malfoy. From its position over the fireplace, it seemed to tower over everything, reigning over the whole room. Unlike most wizard portraits, his was silent and unmoving except for his facial expression, which went from an arrogant sort of haughtiness to a look of downright disgust whenever she and Harry came over. It didn't help that his eyes seemed to follow them when they moved.

"Why won't Malfoy take it down?" Harry asked.

"I can't," Draco replied, walking in the room, carrying a beer and a glass of water. He set both on the coffee table in front of the couch. "It's glued to the wall with a spell of some sort." He turned to face the portrait. "Just had to stick around somehow, didn't you, old man?"

Lucius' eyes narrowed in response.

"Like I said." Harry rubbed his arms again. "Creepy."

"You fought the ugliest war in history and a portrait of my father gives you the chills?"

"It scares me, too, a little bit," Hermione said.

This seemed to reinforce Harry's opinion. "So why do we even hang out here?"

"Because of all the space," Draco said, widening his arms to encompass the whole room. The walls seemed to stretch up all the way to the sky; their voices echoed when they spoke. Hermione had a hard time believing the Manor only housed a family of three. "I have more legroom than both of you combined. And more furniture."

"At least our furniture is comfortable," Harry muttered, shifting on the couch.

"You should sell the house," Hermione said. "It's probably worth a fortune, and this is _too _much room for just one person."

"Honestly, Granger," Draco said. "I thought you were smart."

"What's that supposed to mean?"

"Who the hell would buy this place?" He looked around the room again – the Persian carpets that covered the floor, the drapes on the wall, the pictures on a corner table at the edge of the room. In one of them, Narcissa was doing something Hermione had never seen her do in real life; she was smiling.

There was a tender expression on Draco's face, an odd mix of nostalgia and affection. Hermione shook her head at him. "But that doesn't matter, does it?"

"What do you mean?" he asked.

"Nothing." She focused her attention on Harry, who had started talking about something he and Ron were planning on doing with their new apartment, but from the corner of her eye she could still see Draco looking around his living room. She bit back a smile.

. . . . . .

When Harry left, she decided to stay a little longer to help Draco clean up. He grinned at her while she followed him to the kitchen, throwing their beer bottles away. "Did you stay behind to seduce me, Granger?" She threw a nearby kitchen towel at him and he laughed.

"I don't seduce men who are in relationships."

"Who's in a relationship?" He blinked at her and she gave him a hard look. "Me? Oh, come on, it's not a relationship. I'm just dating for fun. How could I ever be with anyone else when I know nobody will ever love me the way you do?" He shrugged. "Your love is unrequited, of course, but such is the tragedy of life…"

"Why do you always have endless amounts of shit to say?" she asked him.

He paused. "Honestly, I'm not sure."

They went back out to the living room, where she scanned the room and once again told him to consider selling the house. He rolled his eyes at her.

"A little slower than usual today, aren't we? Do I need to repeat myself?" He extended his feet out in front of him, resting them on the coffee table. "Everyone knows this was Voldemort's hideout. Name one sane person who wants to live here."

"You, apparently."

"Since when have I been sane?" He smirked at her. "And since when have you cared about where I live? Not planning to move in with me, are you, Granger?"

She ignored him. "Then renovate it. Tear the whole place down and build something new."

"What, and build you the house of your dreams, where we will live happily ever after?" he asked, but he seemed to consider her suggestion, staring up at the ceiling. He shook his head. "I can't tear it down."

"Why not?"

He looked at her for a minute, looking like he was trying to make up his mind about something. She stared at him until he stood up and extended his hand out to her. "Follow me."

He led her up a staircase that felt endless. She climbed stair after stair, wondering where they were going and exactly what it was he wanted to show her, but then they climbed out a window and fresh air hit her right in the face and she knew: he had brought her up on the roof.

The view hit her as soon as she stepped out onto the crooked edge and took a seat. From where they were, they had the perfect view of the whole city at night, something like a picture on a postcard. In the distance, the lights shining through different windows looked like hazy stars.

He had that same expression on his face again, the odd one he only seemed to reserve for moments like this. "So this is why you won't sell the house?"

He looked at her. The city lights were reflected in his eyes. "It's beautiful, isn't it?"

She watched a car drive down a road, following its headlights until it disappeared behind a building. "But it's not just about the view, is it?"

"Granger." He sighed, tilting his head and looking at the stars. "This house…my parents are everywhere. My mother picked out the color of the walls and the drapes and that ugly couch Potter hates so much. My father had the window built here so I could sit on this roof when I was a kid. If I get rid of the house, I'll be getting rid of them, too."

His sentimentality surprised her. He tapped his foot nervously, as if he was worried he'd said too much.

"I know you might not get it," he said.

"I do," she said, and she meant it. She still wore her father's old coat from time to time, and she was always happy when she would take a whiff of it and it would still smell of him – the strong smell of oak and the faintest hint of cigar smoke. "I get it. I really do."

He looked at her and she looked back at him. In the faint light, his eyes were darker than they normally were, and she could feel her pulse thrumming against her wrist. In spite of all his jokes, she still wasn't immune to that magnetic quality of his, the one that effortlessly pulled women towards him, and now, sitting out in the dark where everything else seemed so far away, she could imagine pulling her close to him, feeling his hands on her waist, on her back, on her face. He was still staring at her and she stared back, holding her breath.

In the end, she was the one who looked away first.

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**A/N: **This won't be that much longer - a chapter or two, at most. Please review!


	3. Part 3

"So what about you, Granger?"

They were sitting at a bar. He'd come over to her house and said he'd had a long week, so he wanted to celebrate it being over. She tied up her hair, grabbed a coat and followed him to the nearest Muggle bar they could find. He bought her a beer, scooted his stool close to hers, and started telling her all about his dating drama.

"What about me, Malfoy?" she asked.

"Nobody on the horizon for you? You've been single from the moment we first became friends."

She raised her eyebrows. "What are you talking about? I was dating Ron when we first became friends."

He smirked before raising his bottle to his lips. When he set the bottle down, he casually leaned away from her. "I'm not including that in this discussion," he said. "That was barely a relationship."

"What?"

"It doesn't count as a relationship. Maybe I'm wrong," he said. He was watching her carefully, analyzing her reaction, keeping his hands busy by running his fingers over the edge of his bottle. "But it always felt like you guys didn't really _want_ to be together. Like you just had to be together for the sake of trying."

"You're wrong."

Her voice had suddenly picked up a rough edge. He gave her a familiar look – the sort of look her parents would give her whenever they thought she was overreacting. "Why are you getting angry?"

"Because," she said. She inhaled deeply, trying to keep her breath steady. "My relationship with Ron nearly tore me to pieces. We have years of memories together. You can't take all that and sum it up like it was nothing–"

"But it was."

Hermione slammed her bottle on the counter. "Don't act like you know what you're talking about."

"But I do." She glared at him. He had enough nerve to continue. "It tore you apart because you were fooling yourself the whole time. You constantly told yourself that this was _it_, that you had found everything you were looking for. But deep down, a part of you knew you were wrong. Your head, your logic, whatever it was – it was fighting you the whole way. In the end, your head won. And nothing hurts worse than losing to yourself."

"Don't–"

"It works the other way around too, you know. Sometimes something is worth fighting for. Sometimes a part of you keeps warning you to stay away, but you fight to believe because it just feels so right. And in the end, _you_ win, in spite of all the odds. And nothing feels better than proving yourself right."

She pushed her stool out from underneath her, standing up. "I'm not even listening," she hissed at him, and then she left. He gave her a two minute start before leaving money on the counter and following her.

"Funny how we always end up walking, isn't it?" His voice made her jump; she hadn't heard him chase after her this time. "Don't you believe in magic, Granger?"

"How is it," she asked him, her hands fisted at her sides, "that you always manage to piss me off?"

"Because you let me," he said, falling into step beside her.

She scowled and continued her angry walk down the road, listening to the slap of her feet against the pavement.

"Why do you always run as soon as things get a little…"

Hermione stopped and swiveled around to face him. "A little _what_?"

He shrugged. "I don't know. It's all fine with you until we start talking about something serious. It's like you're always running away from the truth."

"I am _not_," she hissed, "running from the truth."

"Right." The haughtiness in his tone, as if he knew something she didn't, angered her even further.

"You don't know me."

"Yeah, I do." He took a step closer to her. "Maybe not as well as I should, but I do. And I know you're in denial about something."

She scoffed. "You think I'm in denial?"

"I'm _sure_ you are," he replied.

She looked at him, her voice caught in her throat. There were so many things she wanted to tell him, but instead, all she said was, "Go to hell, Malfoy."

"Fine." Then, so abruptly that it shocked her, he turned and started to walk away. Her eyes widened. They had argued a million times before – he had perfected the art of making her angry and calming her down. Like a light switch, all he had to do was flick it on or off. He would always follow her until he could get her to smile, until her anger became unnecessary.

She wanted to ask him where he was going, why he was leaving, but pride held her tongue. She watched as the distance between them grew larger and larger, watched as he became a blurred figure in the distance, watched until she could no longer see him.

And then she wondered why she had let him go.

. . . . . .

He was wrong about Ron. He was sort of right, too, and she would rather die than admit it, but he was right. When she and Ron had been together, she had fooled herself into thinking that he was the love of her life – she would go through all the motions, like watching his sleeping face in the morning or listening to sappy love songs while thinking of him. But deep down, a part of her would always question the nature of their relationship. _Are you with him because you love him, or because you think he'll never hurt you?_

Sometimes, late in the night when it was quiet all around her and all she could hear was Ron's shallow breathing, she would wonder, _Is this all there is?_

But Draco was wrong when he said their relationship was meaningless. She could still remember that euphoric light-headedness she'd felt when Ron first told her he loved her; the contentment whenever they'd spend all night together and wake up in the morning and start the day by making pancakes together; the hollow emptiness she'd felt when he finally told her that he was sorry, but there was someone else.

It wasn't built to last, but it wasn't meaningless. She knew enough to know the difference.

. . . . . .

She waited for him to come over, and when he didn't, she waited for him to send an owl or send a note or send some kind of sign that would let her know things were back to normal. She missed his snarky comments, missed his annoying habit of always telling the truth. She wasn't used to being the one who needed to apologize, but maybe he deserved it this time. She stopped by a store before heading to the Manor.

The gate opened automatically to let her in. As she passed through the front door, a small bell sounded. She assumed it was to let Draco know that he had a visitor. She stood in the living room while she waited for him, playing with the object in her hand. The portrait of Lucius Malfoy sent her a dirty look every few seconds, as if he was worried she would taint the carpet somehow.

"Sorry about that," Draco said, walking into the room. "I was–" He stopped when he saw her. "Oh. It's you."

"It's me." She shifted from one foot to the other. "Hi."

"Hi," he said. He gave her a small smile that melted away the awkwardness between them. He looked genuinely happy to see her.

She held out the object in her hands and he laughed. It was a lollipop.

He reached for it, but she drew it her hand back. "My relationship with Ron did matter. You can't say it didn't."

"Granger–"

"No, listen." There was a pleading note in her voice that silenced him. She needed him to understand this. "It mattered. Maybe it didn't turn out to be the happily-ever-after that I thought it would be, but it meant something. You can't spend that much time with someone without it meaning something."

A lump was forming in her throat. She was remembering the feeling of loss that had washed over her when she truly understood that her relationship with Ron was over – in one day, in one single moment, she had not only lost the person she loved, but also one of her best friends.

Her eyes were stinging. "You can't say it didn't matter."

Draco set the lollipop down on the table and reached for her. "Hey," he said gently. He pulled her into his arms, holding her while she rested her head in the crook of his neck. He was warm and comforting and smelled oddly of vanilla, as if he had spent the last few hours baking.

They stayed that way for a while. Hermione could've sworn she felt Lucius Malfoy's eyes burning into her back, but for once she didn't care.

. . . . . .

As Hermione predicted, Draco did ditch her friend, Alice. However, Alice wasn't as damaged as Hermione thought she would be. She was perfectly fine. "He was really sweet about the whole thing," she told Hermione over a cup of coffee. "He said he didn't want to lead me on, and that there was someone else."

_Someone else? _Hermione stirred her coffee before taking a sip. The bitter taste hit her in the back of her throat. "So you're ok? You don't feel…used and tossed aside?"

"What are you talking about? He was the one decent guy I've dated in a long time."

Hermione could almost feel the weight of shock pressing down on her jaw. "What are _you_ talking about? He's a total womanizer."

Alice shook her head. "Not with me. Maybe it's because I'm your friend and he didn't want to upset you by hurting me. He talked about you a lot. All the time. You guys must be pretty close."

Hermione took another sip of her coffee. Were they close? She waved the question away as she set her mug down. "We're friends. It's not a big deal. Are you sure you're alright?"

"Yeah, I'm fine. Better than fine, even. He was great with me. He just took me out for dinner every now and then, but he wasn't the sort of guy who was actively trying to score. We didn't have sex, not once."

. . . . . .

She thought about him all day. Alice's words bounced from side to side in her head like an annoying tennis ball. Even when she tried to forget, it was there, bouncing from one side to another.

Something had changed. She didn't know when or how or why, but something had changed. Maybe it was the time they spent together on the roof, or at the bar, or just hanging out. Maybe it was the scent of vanilla. She wasn't sure. All she knew was that something had changed.

She needed to talk to him. She pictured herself going to the Manor and telling him everything that was going through her mind, but in her fantasies he freaked out and looked at her with wide-eyed fear. She hated this scenario, mostly because it was a legitimate possibility.

In other fantasies, when her imagination was being generous, he would listen to her with that tender look on his face and then, when she was done, he would press her against a wall and their lips would meet, softly at first, his hands in her hair. This fantasy would leave her with a pounding heart and a tingle in her back.

_You're crazy, _her mind whispered to her._ What makes you think he feels the same way about you? Go talk to him and see that "someone else" really is _someone else.

But something was pushing her forward. Something had changed and she could never go back to being just friends with him. She couldn't be sure until she talked to him, but she had a feeling things had started changing for him, too.

_You're insane. You're crazy. Don't go. Send him an owl._ She considered this seriously, even took the time to think about what she would write. It would be easier to write it down on paper, where she could erase the words if they came out wrong, but in the end she decided that was the coward's way to do it and she didn't want to be a coward. Not when it came to Draco Malfoy.

_Turn around and go home. _But she couldn't. The gate opened automatically for her again and the bell rang, but she didn't wait for Draco to meet her in the living room this time. She walked up the stairs, her heart pounding louder with every step she took. _Please don't do this to yourself. _But she was too close to give up now.

He was sitting out on the ledge, looking at the city lights. He turned his head to acknowledge her. "Hey."

"Hey," she said. She stayed on the inside, looking out at him from the window. She felt like she was about to take an exam – there was a nervous feeling in the pit of her stomach. She held onto the window sill to stop her hands from shaking. "I talked to Alice today."

"Oh, yeah? How's she doing?"

"She's fine. She's great, actually."

_You don't have to do this_, that voice in her head told her. _Just go sit down next to him and pretend it's all normal. He might not feel the same way about you._

But he might. She would never know unless she was brave enough to do this. She swallowed her fear. "Alice said there was someone else."

He looked over his shoulder at her and held her gaze. "There is."

She thought of a million things she wanted to ask. Who is it? Is it me? When did it happen? In the end, all she could ask was, "Why didn't you tell me?"

"You're smart," he said, and he smiled. "I knew you'd figure it out eventually."

She knew this didn't mean anything, that 'someone else' could still be someone other than her. But then he held out his hand as an invitation to join him and gave her that look, the one where his eyes softened around the corners, the one she had come to associate with the things he loved, and she just knew. Somehow, she just knew.

He had been right. As she joined him out on the ledge and took his hand, she had to admit that he had been right. Sometimes something is worth fighting for. Sometimes a part of you keeps warning you to stay away, but you fight to believe because it just feels so right. And in the end, _you_ win, in spite of all the odds. And nothing feels better than proving yourself right.

. . . . .

. . . . .

. . . . .

**A/N: **Sorry this took so long. School is killing my creative drive. Let me know what you think!


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